different between screech vs whistle

English

Etymology

1602; altered with expressive vowel lengthening from earlier skrech (1577), variant of obsolete scritch, from Middle English skriken, shrichen, schrichen (1250), from Old English (attested as scriccettan) and Old Norse skríkja, both from Proto-Germanic *skr?kijan? (compare Icelandic skríkja, Old Saxon scric?n, Danish skrige, Swedish skrika), derivative of *skr?han? (compare Middle Dutch schriën, German schreien, Low German dial. schrien, schriegen), ultimately of imitative origin.

Pronunciation

• enPR: skr?ch, IPA^(key): /sk?i?t?/
  • (UK) IPA^(key): [sk?i?t?]
  • (US) IPA^(key): [sk?it?]
• Rhymes: -i?t?

Noun

screech (countable and uncountable, plural screeches)

1. A high-pitched strident or piercing sound, such as that between a moving object and any surface.
2. A harsh, shrill cry, as of one in acute pain or in fright; a shriek; a scream.
   • 1826, Mary Shelley, The Last Man, volume 3, chapter 6

     That the night owl should sreech before the noonday sun, that the bat should wheel around the bad of beauty [...]

3. (Newfoundlander, uncountable) Newfoundland rum.
4. A form of home-made rye whiskey made from used oak rye barrels from a distillery.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

screech (third-person singular simple present screeches, present participle screeching, simple past and past participle screeched)

1. To make such a sound.
2. (intransitive, figuratively) to travel very fast, as if making the sounds of brakes being released

Translations

Anagrams

• creches, crèches

English

Etymology

From Middle English whistlen, from Old English hwistlan, hwistlian (“to whistle”), from Proto-Germanic *hwistl?n? (“to make a hissing sound”). Cognate with Icelandic hvísla (“to whisper”), Russian ???????? (svistet?, “to whistle”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /w?sl?/, /??sl?/
• Rhymes: -?s?l

Noun

whistle (countable and uncountable, plural whistles)

2. A device designed to be placed in the mouth and blown, or driven by steam or some other mechanism, to make a whistling sound.
3. An act of whistling.
5. A shrill, high-pitched sound made by whistling.
6. Any high-pitched sound similar to the sound made by whistling.

   the whistle of the wind in the trees

7. (Cockney rhyming slang) A suit (from whistle and flute).
8. (colloquial) The mouth and throat; so called as being the organs of whistling.

   • Let's […] drink the other cup to wet our whistles.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

whistle (third-person singular simple present whistles, present participle whistling, simple past and past participle whistled)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To make a shrill, high-pitched sound by forcing air through the mouth. To produce a whistling sound, restrictions to the flow of air are created using the teeth, tongue and lips.

   Never whistle at a funeral.

   She was whistling a happy tune.

2. (transitive, intransitive) To make a similar sound by forcing air through a musical instrument or a pipe etc.

   The stream train whistled as it passed by.

3. (intransitive) To move in such a way as to create a whistling sound.

   A bullet whistled past.

4. (transitive) To send, signal, or call by a whistle.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• whistle on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Whistle in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)

Anagrams

• whilest